Deathly Hallows breaks box office records (Jul. 15-17)

July 18, 2011 - By Alex

I was wrong, yes, I said I will be first to admit and here it is, I was wrong thinking Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 won’t have enough steam to carry itself past The Dark Knight‘s opening weekend record of $158.4 million (made exactly 3 years ago). But it wasn’t just the weekend, Potter destroyed the previous single day record of $72.7 million held by The Twilight Saga: New Moon with an astonishing $91 million (mostly thanks to a fantastic $43.5 million midnight opening, another record set by the boy that lived).

The exact sum generated by Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 is $169,189,427, almost $11 million more then The Dark Knight. But hold your horses, Potter had 3D and while it only factored 43% of the gross, it still made a big enough difference to boost the flick past Batman.

The previous Harry Potter record was held by Deathly Hallows Part 1 with $125 million last November, so going from that to $169 million is definitely more then just a 3D boost for the series. In the end Potter managed to come full circle after taking the opening weekend record way back in November 2001 with Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, now coming back almost 10 years later to take what was rightfully his. Here’s a good question, will Deathly Hallows Part 2 hold this record for more than 6 months? You know, that is exactly how long it took for Spider-Man to break the Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone opening record in May 2002. The answer to that question is a definite yes since this came out in the summer while Philosopher’s Stone was a November release, so there is nothing coming out that could break said record, at least until The Dark Knight Rises rises July 2012.

Pottermania took its toll on Transformers: Dark of the Moon, down 54.7% in 2nd place with $21.3 million for a new total of $302.8 million in 19 days. Right now I’m inclined to think it will stop around $350 million and since Potter has a chance of making more, North America is still up for grabs, the race is far from over. Either way, I’m ready to bet it will be one or the other in first place at the end of 2011 in North America.

In 3rd place Horrible Bosses was not affected by Potter, falling only 37.2% for $17.7 million and $60.1 million in 10 days. Bad Teacher, a comparable movie that opened higher, was at $59.9 million after 10 days so Horrible Bosses is well on its way to $100+ million.

Zookeeper was 4th and surprisingly, only fell 38.5% grossing $12.3 million for just $42.3 million in 10 days. This is after all an $80 million flick that should have grossed a lot more by now. Horrible Bosses made so far $18 million more and cost $45 million less, the math is simple here.

Cars 2 continues to tarnish more then 15 years of Pixar legacy, now in 5th place with $8.4 million and $165.3 million. Don’t know how to put this any better so here we go: at this point there ain’t no way this cars can race to that fabled $200 million finish line, thus Cars 2 becomes the first Pixar movie not to match its budget in North America (cost $200 million to make).

Definitely not a fine year for animated flicks, at least in the US. Hopefully Tintin can change that when it opens in December.

ShaynBintheplacetoB

I wish they woulda pushed captain america back another week. Its gonna be hard going up against potter with it not slowing down like this